Anthony Isola

Crash Dieting Doesn’t Work for Savers, Either

Deprivation diets don’t work in the long term. The same can be said for deprivation-based financial management. Eliminating all the fun things you can do with money is a surefire way to guarantee failure. In his excellent book “Mindless Eating, Why We Eat More Than We Think,” author Brian Wansink explains why most diets don’t work….

What Risk Is All About: Uncertainty

Howard Mark’s recent  quarterly update to his Oaktree Clients is an investment smoothie for the brain. Reading this memo is an adrenaline shot for your mind. This comes without the unpleasant side effect of your Vitamix blasting through your kitchen like an industrial grade leaf blower. Mark’s analysis of risk is nutrition for your cerebral cortex in…

Kids Can See Sports as a Lousy Investment, So Why Can’t Parents?

Children’s sports are denting the finances of many parents. A recent Wall Street article titled “Why Children Are Abandoning Baseball” pointed out that participation in youth sports leagues, especially baseball, has declined dramatically since 2000. The article, written by Brian Costa, cited a “pervasive emphasis on performance over mere fun and exercise” as a big…

The Best Doctor Gives The Least Medicine

Even though Ben Franklin lived over 200 hundred years ago, his advice is timeless. During Franklin’s time, the medical cure often killed the patient. Too much blood letting and leech treatment led to fatal outcomes. The same can be said for hyper active portfolio management. As Morgan Housel likes to say, “99% of investing is…

You Can Learn To Grow Money In Your Garden

My favorite hobby is gardening, and much of what I know about plants I learned through trial and error. I’m also a Certified Financial Planner, and that’s helped me recognize the many parallels between growing your garden and growing your money. Gardening teaches valuable lessons about wealth management. You see the importance of patience, cost…

Osama Bin Laden Would Have Been An Awful Investor

Osama Bin Laden’s personality traits made him a detestable human being. He most likely would have been an atrocious investor if he would have gravitated toward the field of finance instead of mass murder. Bin Laden constantly sought the reaffirmation of his crazed beliefs. This eventually sealed his fate. This is not unlike the poor…

5 Things You Can Learn about Investing From Mad Max

Financial markets can sometimes resemble an apocalyptic wasteland teeming with the unknown and danger. To survive you must have courage, common sense, and the ability to keep cool under heat. Mad Max A.K.A., “The Road Warrior,” has many of the qualities of a successful investor that you would be wise to emulate. In honor of…